Strawberry Tart

I made this tart for Mother's Day using berries we got at the Farmers' Market. The recipe is from Simply in Season. Easy, fast, and very yummy!

For the crust:
1 cup flour
1/3 cup butter
2 tbsp powdered suger
In a mixing bowl, mix together until crumbly, with no pieces bigger than a pea. press into a 9-inch pie pan or tart pan. Bake at425 for 10-12 minutes until golden. Cool.

For the filling:
1 cup sugar
3 tbsp cornstarch
1 cup mashed strawberries
1/2 orange juice
Blend in saucepan and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture thickens and boils. Boil and stir for 1 minute. Remove from heat.
Add 2 tbsp. lemon juice and cool completely.
Stir in 4-6 cups whole strawberries, then pour into crust. Chill 3 hours.

Then top chilled tart with whipped cream:
1 cup heavy whipping cream
1-2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 cup powdered sugar

Beat with electric mixer until semi-stiff peaks form.

Cherry Tarts

I had some cherries that were a little past ripe and I wanted to use them up so I kind of experimented a little with puff pastry. It was so simple that it's not really a recipe. I think they turned out pretty good; not knock-you-down delicious, but good.

Start with a bowl of cherries. I didn't have very many; there were maybe two dozen or so. Make sure you get the pits out, which is messy business but worth it. Toss the pitted cherries with some flour and sugar and let them sit for awhile to get nice and juicy. You could also add some almond or vanilla extract too.

Unwrap your puff pastry and let it thaw for a bit. The box says 45 minutes but I didn't wait nearly that long; it was more like 20. I rolled it out a little with a rolling pin and then cut it into twelve little squares. The squares were big enough to fit in the cups of a muffin tin with the corners peeking up a little bit.

Then place a couple of cherries in each little pastry cup.














I sprinkled a few of them with some ground almonds too.
Then bake them at 400 degrees for 10-15 minutes until the pastry is puffed up and browned on the edges and the cherries are bubbly.















Then remove the little tarts from the muffin pan, and drizzle them with a mixture of 1 cup powdered sugar/1 tsp of milk/1 tsp. vanilla. (You may have to play with this ratio for the right consistency for the glaze...I just eyeballed it until it was the right thickness.)














Then, eat them up!